Justice Adi's plea impedes Speaker's functions, govt tells HC

 The State government on Thursday submitted to the High Court of Karnataka that the motion moved in the Legislative Assembly against Upalokayukta Justice Subhash Adi was only received by the Speaker and was not admitted by him.

Filing the statement of objections to the petition filed by Justice B Adi, who has challenged the legality of the motion adopted by the Assembly, the State government has stated that until the motion is admitted, Justice Adi will not be restrained from discharging his duties.

The government, in its objections, has said the petition filed before the court is coming in the way of the Speaker discharging his statutory functions to look into the motion moved in the Assembly.

As per the rules, the Assembly Speaker will look into the materials placed before him and if on prima facie finds that an investigation is required to be carried out, he will inform the Chief Justice of the High Court of Karnataka, who would then form a committee to investigate. 

Then a report will be submitted to the Assembly, which will be discussed and a decision will be taken. But for now, the motion has only been received by the Speaker, the government counsel argued.

Further, the State government has said that the petition filed by Justice Adi is a premature and a misconceived one, as the records placed by the petitioner himself state that the motion has only been received by the Speaker.

As the petition is coming in the way of executing the Speaker's functions, the petition has to be dismissed, the government counsel said.

 During the hearing, Advocate General Madhusudan R Naik sought more time from the bench as the petitioner's advocate B V Acharya was out of town.  Justice Ashok B Hinchigeri adjourned the matter for further hearing till January 12.